Troll Trolling
by tonberrys
Summary: When a classmate pokes fun at her bizarre Hallowe'en costume, Tonks gets revenge.


This one-shot was written for Round 3 (90s Nostalgia!) of the 2018 Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition, Season 6. I'm writing as a Chaser (3rd Position) for the Wimbourne Wasps.

Position Prompt: Troll Doll  
Optional Chaser Prompt #1: (colour) mauve  
Optional Chaser Prompt #2: (word) horror  
Optional Chaser Prompt #3: (object) glitter

 **Additional Note:** In response to some confusion, I just wanted to confirm that Tonks is still written as a Hufflepuff in this story; I just don't interpret Hogwarts as having strict rules about hanging out at other House tables/areas if you really want to, so she spends a lot of time around Gryff locales with Charlie.

* * *

 **Troll Trolling**

* * *

"Just two more days!" Hogwarts was buzzing with the promise of an oncoming celebration - her first Hallowe'en as a Hogwarts student - and though this year's decor had yet to spring up in the Great Hall, Tonks could hear the energy crackling around her as she approached the Gryffindor table, lunch dwindling to an end around them. (Alternately, it could also be the chomping of…)

"Uh Hah-ohwe'en feaf cannah co' fad enough." Charlie's words were making an unsuccessful attempt to maneuver around the pumpkin pasty in his mouth, punctuated by a little cough.

"And my mum says _I_ have no manners," Tonks said, her tone too cheerful to sting, and as Charlie swallowed his too big bite, he flashed a sheepish smile. Shortly after, he brushed at his mouth; maybe it had been to wipe a crumb, but his face was so thickly freckled that she couldn't actually tell much difference.

"Bill was telling me that there are live bats, massive pumpkins that several students could fit inside if we tried, charmed instruments playing music..." His smile grew wider, and Tonks mirrored it. "Your dad's a Muggle-born, right? Did you do any Muggle things for Hallowe'en when you were at home?"

Lifting an emphatic shoulder, Tonks responded, "My parents don't always say. I know our telly is made by Muggles, but I don't know a lot about Hallowe'en celebrations." Suddenly, as if sparked by the words, she brightened. "Wait - actually - we did go to a costume party last year. It was definitely Muggle. My dad's cousin invited us, and I wasn't allowed to morph, but it was great because everybody was dressed up. There were a lot of kids, and one of the girls said she was a witch, but she had on a mask that was green with a huge nose. The robes and hat were alright, though. Dad told me I wasn't allowed to tell her I was an actual witch; apparently Muggles have a funny idea about what a witch is."

"A green face? Weird," Charlie agreed, but the smile remained on his face. "My dad would love to go to one of those, but I don't think my mum would let him. She thinks the Muggles would probably think it's weird to ask them about their Muggle things."

"Probably," Tonks admitted, and though she didn't want to say so out loud, there were some strange-looking boxes at the party that she'd never seen before and never did ask about.

"Wicked, though," Charlie circled back, cutting off the thought. "What other costumes were there?"

"I didn't recognise some of them - Dad said they were Muggle jobs and the like - but there were some animals and magical creatures too." A meaningful smile spread across her face. "People dressed as cats, unicorns, but unicorns are another thing my dad said they think are fake."

"With your hair, you'd make a convincing pygmy puff," Charlie said as his hands moved in a fluffing gesture. "Dragons would have been cooler than unicorns, but it's at least better than something like a troll."

Tonks was about to object to the prospect of dressing up like a big, dumb troll - an intention evident on her face - but just as soon as she opened her mouth, that expression stretched out into a face-splitting grin. "Actually, a troll would be _perfect_."

"If you say so."

* * *

In the crowd of students, Tonks could see her friend's distinctive red hair, bright and glaring against a sea of browns and blondes and shades of black. Hallowe'en decor was spread lightly about the castle, but it was in the Great Hall that she found the thick of the festivities, just as Bill had told Charlie. Massive carved pumpkins, floating candles, bats, violins crooning out chilling tunes that wriggled beneath your skin and crept about with spindly fingers.

"Charlie!" she called out when she was a few paces away, and when a glance back at her startled out a staggered yell, she thought she must have done a pretty accurate job.

"What _are_ you? Is that some sort of Muggle creature?"

"I'm a troll," she responded, fluffing up the mauve monstrosity she had morphed on her head: hair that had been coloured and adjusted to rise up like a giant purple teardrop. Her face was lightly glittered on the cheeks, but more offensive than the glitter itself was the deep creases her smile left and the soulless black eyes she had mimicked too accurately. (A bit over the top, maybe.)

"That is not a troll!" he shouted out through the sudden burst of a laugh.

"It's a Muggle toy. A troll doll."

"It's a bloody horror!" Patrick Davies said from the other side of Charlie, pinching his expression.

"You'll be bloody if you call me a horror!" she said with playful bravado, holding up an enlarged fist. "Well maybe not bloody," she immediately amended, "but most likely very sparkly, which I would say is probably worse."

"I call your bluff," Davies said with something that was probably supposed to be a grin but looked a bit more like a grimace when he looked at her eyes again. "That is so creepy. How do you even do that?"

"Just you wait," she said, pointing between her eyes and his, though her overly thick fingers felt more clumsy than they did in their natural, nimble state.

Charlie was still laughing when they split off from the gaggle of Gryffindor boys and continued to do so every time he looked at her. Attempting to flick his temple did little good because her fingers weren't really flicking properly, but it did not stop her from trying.

"You are by far the most terrifying thing in this room," Bill had told her when they found him with some of the other third years a few minutes later. "The Bloody Baron better get ready to give up his crown of spooks."

Tonks preened a little, and as they settled into their respective spots for the start of the feast, she thought to herself that it was just the beginning.

* * *

When Tonks owled her parents to ask for 'her pinkish-purple-haired troll doll, except fifty of the same one' without explanation or preamble, they took her more seriously than she had expected but less seriously than she had hoped. There were only twenty replicated versions of the troll piled in the parcel, but she would make do with the ammunition she had. Cruel though it was, she had practiced her glitter charms for just such an occasion, and by the time she got to the end of her line of plastic comrades - armed to spew their sparkles at a touch - she felt she was probably better at it than anyone had a right to be.

The first troll was planted on the railing outside the Fat Lady's portrait, held in place by a rather flimsy attempt at a sticking charm, but the glittery glare Patrick Davies shot across the Great Hall at breakfast suggested that it had held well enough. Charlie punctuated his roommate's annoyance with a wink, and Tonks winked back, tugging her bag into her lap.

The second troll, just as mauve in appearance, was planted at Davies's seat in History of Magic, staring back at him with a beady smile. He set to yanking it free, that time, with a shimmering force that flung her doll across the room and through Professor Binns like a palely floating target. The class roared, but Binns didn't seem to notice.

The third troll was floated into his bag during lunch. Upon being noticed, that same troll was subsequently floated into the (garbage) bin with an emphatic "I know it's you!" in the general direction of the Hufflepuff table, to which Tonks offered an unapologetic grin.

The fourth troll was smuggled onto his pillow by Charlie, and though Tonks was not present to view the reaction, she reckoned that the shrieking reenactment was probably spot on. When Charlie reported the troll being thrown out his Gryffindor Tower window and into a nearby tree, trailing glitter in its wake, she was half-tempted to hunt it down during their free time the next morning. By the time she was rolling out of bed the next day, there wasn't time; the troll was alone, but this onslaught had its sacrifices, and she would have to come back for her loyal soldier later.

Gryffindor and Slytherin had just been released from their Potions class on the second day of her onslaught when Davies stomped up with a troll dangling by the point of its mauve hair. The toy was dripping with a sparkling green substance - today's potion, she would guess - and Davies wore an expression of subtle horror as he thrust it forward.

"I'm sorry I mocked your creepy costume, but can you call off your creepy teleporting doll? I'm starting to hate this colour." Davies pulled a sour expression. "It's everywhere. Did you seriously climb up in a tree to get it down?"

Although she had considered it, Tonks shook her head. "I don't need to," she said mysteriously, trying not to grin.

"Well, you can have it back." He let the doll drop into her hand, unpleasantly slimy to the touch. She had hoped Davies would drag it out longer and push back with more a bit more dedicated stubbornness, but as it turned out, she hadn't needed fifty troll accomplices, after all.

Carrying the troll by the tip of its hair, now a revolting mix of purple and green, Tonks started back to her dorm to drop it off with the others. The truce was upon them.

* * *

Tiny mauve spikes lined the arch of the castle entrance - nineteen in total, though it was difficult to tell one pointed fluff from another. With the twentieth clutched in her hand, Tonks dipped her head in response to their vigil and had walked back into the castle just in time for Charlie to mosey up with Davies in tow.

"I'll say it again: You're a right horror," Davies said to her, looking as if he was seriously considering his ability to chunk her remaining troll into the Black Lake still visible behind her. One, maybe, she thought as as he eyed the doll a little too aggressively. One, but not twenty, she thought again with a little smile.

With a conspiratorial glance back to the vigil above, Tonks flipped around on her heels, bounding past the two boys and down towards the Hufflepuff common room. Behind her, she could hear:

"That's the last one, isn't it, Charlie?"

"It's definitely _one_."


End file.
